PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Samuel Kaski

Also known as Sami Kaski

Samuel Kaski is a machine learning professor, based half the time at Aalto University in Finland and half at the University of Manchester, who works on probabilistic modelling and collaborative AI for decision making and design. He completed a doctorate on self-organizing maps at Helsinki University of Technology in 1997, directed the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology HIIT from 2010 to 2015, and held an Academy of Finland professorship for 2016–2020. In 2019, as director of the Finnish Center for Artificial Intelligence, he saw FCAI chosen to host ELLIS Unit Helsinki; he joined Manchester in a shared professorship in 2020 and received a UKRI Turing AI World-Leading Researcher Fellowship in 2021. In 2025, ELLIS Institute Finland started with him as founding director, and he won a European Research Council Advanced Grant of €2.5 million. He directs the institute today, leads FCAI and the Manchester Centre for AI Fundamentals, and sits on the ELLIS board.

Born
1968
Works
832
Citations
15,546
h-index
61
Badges

Years link to their sources. Publication numbers from OpenAlex, as of 22 October 2026.

Timeline

  1. 1997

    Doctorate on self-organizing maps

    He completes his doctoral dissertation, Data exploration using self-organizing maps, at Helsinki University of Technology in 1997, supervised by Teuvo Kohonen.

  2. 2010–2015

    Directing HIIT in Helsinki

    He directs the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology HIIT, a joint institute of Aalto University and the University of Helsinki, from 2010 to 2015. By 2015 he is also a professor of computer science at Aalto University.

  3. 2016–2020

    Academy of Finland professorship

    The Academy of Finland funds him as an Academy Professor for 2016–2020, and he directs the Finnish Centre of Excellence in Computational Inference Research COIN from 2015 to 2017. His work develops computational methods for interactive multi-source data analysis and machine learning, applied first to personalised medicine.

  4. 2019

    Hosting ELLIS Unit Helsinki

    In October 2019, he is appointed to the Finnish government's Research and Innovation Council. In December 2019, as director of the Finnish Center for Artificial Intelligence FCAI, he sees ELLIS announce its first units, with FCAI hosting ELLIS Unit Helsinki.

  5. April 2020

    A shared professorship in Manchester

    He joins the University of Manchester in a shared professorship with Aalto University, created under a strategic agreement between the two universities, and becomes Director of the Christabel Pankhurst Institute for Health Technology, responsible in particular for AI. His main task is to set up a strong AI center in Manchester.

  6. 2021

    A Turing AI fellowship

    He receives a Turing AI World-Leading Researcher Fellowship from UKRI in 2021, one of five awarded in the first round, to found a new center of excellence at Manchester. The funding covers a research group for five years, and the new unit develops AI that helps people define and specify the goals they want it to pursue.

  7. 2025

    Founding ELLIS Institute Finland

    In 2025, he becomes founding director of ELLIS Institute Finland, the second institute in the ELLIS network, with startup premises on the Aalto University campus. He also wins a European Research Council Advanced Grant of €2.5 million for machine learning that generalises outside its training data, using simulation and human expertise in an expert re-design loop.

  8. As of October 2026

    Director of ELLIS Institute Finland

    He directs ELLIS Institute Finland, which has hired ten professors who started at six Finnish universities and plans a nationwide healthcare foundation model. As a machine learning professor, he splits his time between Aalto University and the University of Manchester and works on probabilistic modelling and collaborative AI for decision making and design. He also leads FCAI and the Manchester Centre for AI Fundamentals and sits on the ELLIS board.

Career

  1. Since 2025ELLIS Institute FinlandFounding Director
  2. Since 2020University of ManchesterProfessor
  3. Since 2019Finnish Center for Artificial IntelligenceDirector
  4. Since 2010Aalto UniversityDirector, Professor of Computer Science
  5. NowEuropean Laboratory for Learning and Intelligent SystemsBoard Member
  6. From 2019Research and Innovation CouncilMember
  7. 2015–2017Finnish Center of Excellence in Computational Inference ResearchDirector
  8. 2004–2010University of Helsinki

Education

  1. 1997Aalto UniversityDoctorate

From the biography and OpenAlex affiliations (the years of papers that list the organization), so some years are approximate.

Most-cited works

  1. Self organization of a massive document collection2000 · IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks · 908 citationsWith Teuvo Kohonen
  2. A community effort to assess and improve drug sensitivity prediction algorithms2014 · Nature Biotechnology · 772 citations
  3. WEBSOM – Self-organizing maps of document collections1998 · Neurocomputing · 495 citationsWith Teuvo Kohonen
  4. Dimensionality reduction by random mapping: fast similarity computation for clustering2002 · 388 citations
  5. Community assessment to advance computational prediction of cancer drug combinations in a pharmacogenomic screen2019 · Nature Communications · 362 citations

From OpenAlex, as of 21 October 2026.

  1. 11% of AI doctorate holders from 2010 to 2016 founded or led a company or lab by 10 years after graduationIncludes Samuel Kaski. We estimate how often AI doctorate holders founded or led a company or lab by 10 years after graduation, how waiting times compare between founders and top jobs, and which universities trained the most.
  2. Google has the highest combined h-index among AI organizationsIncludes European Laboratory for Learning and Intelligent Systems. We estimate that Google holds the highest combined h-index at 8,016, while universities account for 73% of the deduplicated total across AI organizations.
  3. 44% of AI career moves go from one university to anotherIncludes European Laboratory for Learning and Intelligent Systems. We estimate how 26,439 AI career moves link universities, companies, labs, nonprofits and government research centers, with decade counts, net flows and the top paths.
  4. 5 of the 25 people with the most-cited recent papers also lead on career citationsIncludes European Laboratory for Learning and Intelligent Systems. We compare citations to 2023–2025 papers with career citations and h-index, after correcting reviewed publication-date errors: who leads, when they started and where they work.

Colleagues

People with dated positions at the same organization in the same years.

Sources and credits

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  1. Samuel Kaski – Wikipedia fi.wikipedia.org. Checked 20 October 2026.
  2. Samuel Kaski and Matti Keloharju appointed Academy Professor | Aalto University aalto.fi. Checked 20 October 2026.
  3. Professor Samuel Kaski selected to the Finnish government’s Research and Innovation Council | Aalto University aalto.fi. Checked 20 October 2026.
  4. Helsinki and FCAI will host a new ELLIS unit for top AI research — FCAI fcai.fi. Checked 20 October 2026.
  5. University announces unique new health-AI partnership manchester.ac.uk. Checked 20 October 2026.
  6. Samuel Kaski receives major international funding for the development of AI methods | Aalto University aalto.fi. Checked 20 October 2026.
  7. New Fundamentals: ELLIS Institute Finland launches with bold scientific ambitions | Aalto University aalto.fi. Checked 20 October 2026.
  8. Finland’s new AI powerhouse: ELLIS Finland and ERC join forces to solve AI’s biggest weakness - Tech.eu tech.eu. Checked 20 October 2026.
  9. ELLIS Institute Finland is launching machine learning fundamentals out of the lab | Aalto University aalto.fi. Checked 20 October 2026.
  10. Samuel Kaski kaski-lab.com. Checked 20 October 2026.
  11. Meet the Board: Samuel Kaski | European Laboratory for Learning and Intelligent Systems ellis.eu. Checked 20 October 2026.